Say, are your choices immaterial?

Isnrsquot dating about validation rather than love I think so What about youWell according to the charming lead Dakota Johnson in Celine Songrsquos beautifully lit minimalist Materialists mdash playing at select theatres near you that Irsquove watched twice already once to catch second time on to hold mdash ldquodating is effort loversquos easyrdquoJohnson says ldquoLove simply walks into your lifehellip You canrsquot help itrdquo As in it happens to you if it does at all Thatrsquos a rare line in this hardened movie where you might feel mush in the roomUnlike the flamboyant Hugh Grant type energy of a rsquo90sish romcom Materialists 2025 is a romantic drama that looks way lighter than it feelsItrsquos steeped in practicalities over feelgood fantasy albeit set between really goodlooking people stillJohnson plays a highend matchmaker Lucy from a dating consultancy firm in New York City This matchmaking I reckon is similar to how arranged marriages work among desisIn the sense that through a common connection menwomen behave like merchandise at a mart exchanging foolproof biodata enumerating professional and socialfamilial attributesOnly that families donrsquot get directly involved in this ldquomathrdquo shared between Lucyrsquos clients Theyrsquore on their own and evidently lonely thatrsquos somewhat the filmrsquos latent theme The desperate line you hear often is they donrsquot wanna or are gonna ldquodie alonerdquoWhich as you know is a fallacy Like YOLO for lsquoyou only live oncersquo You live every day You will die once It should be YWDOLikewise everybody dies alone You probably donrsquot wish to live by yourself How you define that is up to you isnrsquot itSay I could go with lifelong friends for a deeply caring companionship for someone else a conventional ldquolifepartnerrdquo even in the age of consensual separations may be a nonnegotiable What do you thinkMaybe itrsquos the blissful naivete emerging from not being towerlike tall myself my biggest takeaway from Materialists is how among all the math in the datingexchange mdash height for women seeking men is perhaps highest on the priority list sixfeetplus along with annual income 500K and age for men seeking women ideally girls in their 20sTIL Today I learnt thanks to Songrsquos second film therersquos a possibly popular leglengthening surgery that makes you taller by six inches max mdash if you spend 200K to insert rod that painfully over time pulls bone apart to allow new bone growth in the gapItrsquos a fine investment says datingexpert Lucy that ldquodoubles a manrsquos value in the marketrdquoSongrsquos Materialists instantly stands out in the lsquonow showingrsquo section of the theatremultiplex with most of the Hollywood showtimings as for a couple of decades now comprising regurgitative franchisesreboots for nostalgia baits with littlenothing to sayWithin the same American mainstream Koreanborn Song had pulled off a stunningly sensitive semiautobiographical debut Past Lives 2023 that remains among the most real EastWest migrant storiesconversationstarters mdash about a girl tracked between age 12 24 and 36 and a childhood friend from back where shersquos fromMost people move places even figuratively and naturally move on What about those they leave behind How much of your past would you like to participate in your present I guess with age we learn to more seamlessly mix the two Songrsquos Materialists is not so much about dating consultant Lucyrsquos clients as itrsquos about her Lucyrsquos single herself Presumably not so ready to mingle Marriage is on her agenda that shersquos clear is a ldquodealrdquo driven by money foremostShe possibly learnt this the hard way given her own background and dating someone that meant ldquoshitty car shitty bedroom shitty restaurantshelliprdquoBut itrsquos not like Guy 1 Chris Evans she was with was congenitally designed to wait tables at banquetsHersquos an aspiring theatreactor Talent I suppose transcends class or does it This allows Guy 1 the aura of having picked semipoverty as a choice No matter what the futureLuckily Lucy lands a lsquoperfect 10rsquo Pedro Pascal to date in dating math a ldquounicornrdquo tall beyond wealthy goodlooking polished emotionally stablehellipShe seems suitably besotted He makes her feel ldquovaluablerdquo in his company That according to her is the reason to be with someone Is itAn abiding mystery for the audience could well be whyhow she instantly gets over him Maybe you donrsquot connect with the perfectBesides that the film had a deep enough impact on me that I canrsquot ever look at Pascal on the screen anymore without thinking hersquos had a sixinch leglengthening surgeryLucy who still considers herself ldquojudgmental materialistic and coldrdquo goes back to Guy 1 Irsquom told many people have deemed Materialists thus a ldquobroke boy propagandardquo picture Cut through the centre the film at its core is really about the choice between checklist perfection money height etc and lovecareI personally know both types of men from this movie Can I tell which one could work better for Lucyyou in the long run Letrsquos suppose heartbreak is around the corner regardless mdash better to cry about loss of love in a Lamborghini yesnoLucy first broke up with Guy 1 because he was broke Would you Have placed quite a lotta questions above if Irsquove read up till here Yeah I really do wanna knowdiscussMayank Shekhar attempts to make sense of mass cultureHe tweets mayankw14 Send your feedback to mailbagmiddaycomThe views expressed in this column are the individualrsquos and donrsquot represent those of the paper